Been here too long to quit now…
Just chapped my arse.
I haven’t messed with too many distributors pre 1935 , but I’ve had my hands on some 4200+ or so built after 1950 for sure. And I can tell you guys, out of all those, I’ve never seen a factory GM aluminum housing distributor where they’ve oopsed and forgot the 1/16 holes in the top bushing . In a manufacturing deal that’s pretty damn amazing I think.
I promise you theyre there. Now I will say they’ve pressed a good many in where the hole was partially blocked by the support stanchions between the 5 cavities. That will make it look like there arent any if you’re not on your A game looking. The only way I’ve not seen any was either someone in the past replaced it, or a rebuilder replaced it.
GM got it right.
The first of the “modern cast iron distributors utilized a 660 bronze oilite type bushing that was raw bronze and had a notch cut right into the side of the bushing where a cotton wick was pushed in beside the bushing. You could literally see the lump inside the bushing bore when the shaft was removed. This wick was fed by an oiler tube and you were to put 8-10 drops of a heavy grade of engine oil down the tube at every oil change interval at around 2000 miles.
From there they went to the same type bushing without the bitch but then began packing the “well” with sawdust and still utilizing the cotton wick , it just didn’t penetrate the bushing bore. Between the cotton wick holding oil and the oiled down sawdust up top, ypu were pretty good.
Up for pretty much the whole time gm said the distributors “ needed no periodic maintenance outside an occasional 8-10 drops of oil in the oiler tube”
Well… that may in fact have been a bit optimistic. But it’s hard to argue the durability of the things early on.
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